Sake Cup
by TheWhyteRabbyt
Summary: A young woman caught in a rainstorm finds herself lost in a minuscule restaurant, in the company of a mysterious stranger. She hears a story that's a journey on a winding path and the end is a twist lost to emotion.


Aki rushed down the grimy sidewalk, her flashy red heels the only contrast to her black business suit and the surrounding pitch-colored New York City scene. An unforeseen spring monsoon gushed from the heavens above, slamming against the pavement and striped overhangs that lined the top of shops on the side street. An earthy scent of wet mulch permeated the air only to be shot through with exhaust fumes from taxis that sped by, trafficking passengers who had more pocket change than an average-class Japanese-American woman. Aki was an office worker and nothing more—a taxi ride was a luxury for the specific purpose of visiting her aging parents every other weekend. She didn't mind walking, but more often than not she was prepared with a candy apple red umbrella that matched her scuffed shoes that were attempting to guide her to the nearest shelter on this stormy night. When she became disoriented from running, she turned into the nearest door that had an open sign draped across the window. Too exhausted to mind what sort of place it was, the warm lantern lights that filtered past ivory curtains in the wide front window were enough to ease her nerves.

A small bell jingled from the doorknob as she stumbled in on hardwood flooring. The young woman gazed around her, peeling drenched hair away from her face to assess what sort of place she was in. Peaceful music utilizing a good deal of some East Asian instrument flowed through the very _cramped _room and the familiar smell of cooking rice made Aki realize that she was—in fact—inside of an izakaya. A musical clatter of a sake glass sounded from deeper in the dim room and Aki noticed a second patron—a young man with bristling chocolate hair and hints of copper streaks. He wore a sharply-cut suit and possessed slanted eyes that were so pale brown they appeared gold. Striking to be sure, but this was New York. Few things surprised residents anymore.

Aki turned to glance out the window in the hopes that the rain had stopped. Dismayed that the rain was only pouring harder, she gave up on leaving anytime soon and gingerly picked her way over to the bar where she sat as far away from the intimidating business man as she could. She set her purse on the floor with an embarrassing _squelch_ and set about wringing out her hair. When her hair was straightened, she adjusted her blazer and finally began to tap her nails on the counter. She checked her phone; twenty minutes had passed without a hint of a staff member. There was only the man at the end of the counter, continually pouring sake into his cup and drinking it with practiced finesse. He never glanced her way.

Another five minutes passed and panic burbled up through Aki's throat in the form of a hasty question: "Is there a chef or anyone here?" The man at the end of the counter stiffened and Aki wondered if he really did slide his honeyed glance her way before returning to his drinking. The music that had seemed so comforting had faded into uncomfortable silence and the girl wondered if the restaurant was actually open at all. Her skirt had begun to dry but the rain continued its belligerence on the sidewalk outside, so she tried again.

"I'm sorry to bother you, but do you know if there are any staff here?" Her voice quavered at the end and she berated herself for working up the courage to annoy this frightening person. The man didn't move at all this time and Aki eventually stared at her folded hands in her lap, too scared to ask again. When she thought she might have checked into a spirit hotel on accident, a smooth, paced voice slithered over to her from the end of the bar.

"The chef usually goes out to play poker with some buddies at this time. If you were looking to get drunk at this time of night you sure picked the wrong place."

Aki looked up at the man in surprise. He stared at her blankly for another beat before turning back to the counter and drinking his last cup of sake. Aki watched as he tipped the bottle towards the cup before growling when a single drop slid into his glass. Moving heavy with reluctance, he pressed down on the counter and stood. He was taller than Aki had surmised. He disappeared around the corner and Aki heard noise from the kitchen. Moments later he reappeared with a new bottle of sake. Aki cursed and prayed for the rain to let up, gripping her skirt and closing her eyes. A rattle startled her into looking up—the man had set a clean glass next to her and drawn his own to the seat beside her, which he settled onto with a quiet exhale. He poured the alcohol into her cup before filling his own and set the bottle on the counter harshly. He picked it up and began to drink, staring over the counter and into oblivion.

"T-thanks." Aki managed to squeak out.

"No problem." He murmured around the cup.

Aki slid her own into her palms, rolling it gently and wondering what sort of person her current company was. She took a sip and felt the warm liquid seep into her bones. Her hair felt as though it had started to dry.

"So why is a commoner like you running around the city without an umbrella on a night like this? You some sort of escort? You should work on your outfit. Bet you're barely making ends meet dressing like that."

Aki's cheeks colored at the young man's brazenness to suggest such a thing to a complete stranger. Before she could stop herself, she responded.

"How dare you! I just missed my bus and I can't afford a taxi! Anyway who uses the term 'commoner' anymore?" _I thought I was dressed nicely, too_, she added silently, glancing down at her shirt and jacket. The man's brows furrowed slightly and Aki thought she might have angered him, but they relaxed just as quickly and he turned back to his drink. A faint trace of sorrow played about his eyes and he murmured quietly.

"You remind me of someone."

"Oh? A friend of yours?" Aki raised an eyebrow. The man nodded.

"Yeah, you could say a best friend... She's getting married tomorrow actually. I can't make the wedding, so I'm here"—he raised his glass—"celebrating in advance."

Aki nodded sympathetically, "I see. Work obligations?"

He shook his head and bit his lip, hesitating, "No. Not work."

"Oh... um..."

He blinked thick auburn lashes, "Emotional obligations."

"That sounds like a story," the girl whispered, hastily drinking more of her sake. "Care to elaborate? Or is that too personal? I—ugh—I'm sorry." She pressed a hand across her face, embarrassed that she got carried away with this mysterious stranger.

"Well, that rain isn't letting up and I'm in no rush... What could a commoner like you do with the information anyway?" He seemed to be speaking more to himself than to her and Aki licked her teeth, holding her breath for a reason she didn't know.

"My name is Hikaru Hitachiin. Call me whatever you like—I just thought I'd get it out of the way." The man named Hikaru leaned over to refill Aki's glass and she inclined her head in silent thanks.

"My name is Aki. Aki Itou."

Hikaru smirked, "Nice to meet you, commoner. Now, let's see. It all started my first year of high school. At my school, we had this thing called a host club."

* * *

"Through a series of events, this girl who was only going to my school because of a scholarship began to hang around with us. No one knew she was a girl though, because this chick was a hot mess. Cut her hair because of some bubble gum and dressed just _terrible_. Not cute at all." Hikaru paused and his gold eyes grew misty, "She was cute though. We just didn't know right away."

"That's incredibly cheesy," Aki said. Hikaru only nodded.

"We got close to her because she broke something that was worth a lot of money. I don't know, we were stupid teenagers back then and we tried to make her pay for it through work. However, time has a way of making you see the good in people you wouldn't normally care to know, and this girl was that to a 't'. Would you believe me if I said I had an identical twin?"

Aki stared at this impossibly stunning man and gulped, "I think it might be too much for the world." Hikaru grinned devilishly at her reply.

"It was. My twin and I had gone through some things and it had... well, _twisted _us. We were very cruel and very lonely, but we couldn't bear to let anyone in the habitat we had created for ourselves. Yet, at the same time, we couldn't bear not to try to drag people into our problems. We were a very messed up pair, but we loved each other very much." He took a hearty gulp of sake and seemed to roll it across the back of his tongue as he spoke, "This girl... she was the only person who could tell the difference between us. In this world where no one cared enough to notice the soul of a human being, _she_ did. She reached into our lives and said, 'You may look alike, but you're very different.' The best part, she didn't even know it. She thought it was something that was obvious."

Hikaru chuckled darkly and went quiet. Aki thought he might have finished his story. A tangled sort of unrest boiled in her stomach. Was it curiosity?

"Mister... Hitachiin?"

"She was so stupid."

Aki turned her gaze towards the door, swallowing heavily. A thick lump of emotion clogged her throat. Hikaru continued.

"When you're fifteen, it's easy to fall in love, and I did. I fell in love with this girl who pushed my thoughts around with a fork and smiled about things like high-end sushi. She dressed like a boy and acted like a philosophy professor and whenever she got close to me I couldn't feel my breath—just hers. I think," Hikaru leaned back on the bar stool, his hands gripping the underside of his thighs as he stared at the ceiling, the rose of inebriation glowing from his porcelain cheeks. "I think we all felt that way about her in some respects. I know that my brother did... and so did the Boss."

"Boss?"

"The host club was all his idea. Make a place for frivolous rich girls to waste their time and buy crappy merchandise for money that wasn't theirs. Of course, Tamaki never made it seem that way. He just wanted to make people happy. 'Throw a group of handsome gentlemen into society and girls will be happy for miles', he would say. We'd give them tea, snacks... the time of day. We'd play to their interests—eventually each girl would settle for a type, as it were."

"Oh."

"But this girl, this _commoner_, she wasn't even looking for a type. How can you try to love someone when the only thing you know is how to act?" Hikaru's voice raised a pitch, "How can you even begin to understand what love means when you can't even love yourself? Oh, I tried. I tried to force myself to grow, to understand, to be somebody that she would fall for." His voice trembled, "I wanted to make her feel what I did. I wanted her to blush and smile and I wanted to see the light that filtered through her hair to sparkle in her eyes and I wanted to lock her up where no one else could see it. But... you can't lock up someone who doesn't even know how to be caught. You can't tell someone you love them when you survive by lying."

Aki's breath slipped between her pink lips, "Did you tell her you loved her?"

"I did."

"What happened?"

Hikaru turned to gaze at the small woman, a Mona Lisa smile pulling at his lips. Though his eyes were half-mast, Aki could see they were filled with tears. Tears he would not spill. He breathed in as if his chest was made of lead and cleared his throat. "Do you want some rice? Kawamura usually has some salted mackerel lying around." Aki nodded as he slid away and disappeared into the kitchen once more, leaving his silk-lined jacket draped on the bar seat. Aki took a moment to clear her own throat and process the strange tale that was unfolding onto her. Maybe she was crazy for staying in an empty building alone with a strange man at night... or maybe fate had a way of pushing people who need help into one's path. Feeling a wave of curiosity, she leaned forward on the bar to the point of standing on tip toe to peer into the kitchen, hoping to catch a glimpse of Hikaru when he wasn't hunched over a sake cup.

He was standing at a counter with a pristine white apron tied across his dignified neck, causing the shaggy hairs at his nape to prickle almost comically. His slanted eyes bobbed around as he gathered some bowls and a rice scoop. He set the tools on the counter and folded his sleeves up past his elbows, stuffing a pair of glittering cufflinks into his pocket. His pale arms were eggshell mercury as he fluidly scooped rice from the immense rice cooker into perfect globes that nestled like pearls in the stereotypical bowls that he had plucked from the shelf behind him. Aki folded her lips inward and licked them as the warm smell of the grain wafted over. Perhaps because this man was a veritable work of art, as well. It wasn't attraction, it wasn't love—this man was bred from finer stock, plain as day. Aki wondered what sort of rich man from Japan lived in New York City, and what sort of man was he that he spent his evenings in this worn izakaya that was far from the lap of luxury? Hikaru reached onto the neighboring counter's warmer and grabbed a piece of mackerel, setting it onto a cutting board and setting his sharp shoulders to work, bobbing as he used a sharper knife to cut up the meager food. Aki sensed him become aware of being watched and sat back into her chair so fast she almost fell backward.

She released the breath she didn't know she was holding and sipped her sake. A deeper sort of silence overtook her and with a gasp she realized—the rain had stopped.

"You can leave if you want. Drinks on the house." Aki turned to see Hikaru arrive at their seats with the bowls of food in hand. She accepted the bowl and the chopsticks he handed her as she shook her head.

"Please finish your story... I'm honestly in no rush to go home to an empty apartment."

"Hey"—Hikaru reached forward and pinched Aki's cheek with a dark look. "Girls like you should be careful what you say; it may be taken wrong."

Aki found herself blushing again and muttered, "I just want to hear your story." Hikaru nodded as he played with some rice at the ends of his chopsticks. He placed a polite amount inside his mouth and chewed thoughtfully.

"As time passed, all of the host club's members changed. Some graduated, some grew to have new ambitions, and some grew to understand their own intentions towards this seemingly unremarkable girl. So much happened that it gets hard to remember. I confessed, and she said no. That was really it. No matter what I tried, I would never be able to catch up with Boss. She loved him too much." Aki's heart stopped for a moment as she choked out that one word.

"Boss?"

Only then she remembered why they were discussing this girl in the first place.

Because she was getting married tomorrow.

The girl in red heels raised a napkin to her lips to hide their trembling. Hikaru shrugged, nonplussed.

"We grew up after that. I continued to dye my hair and focus on taking over my mother's business, my brother helped me through it in his foolish, caring way. The host club grew it's business, but I think we all lost our spark when we accepted that Haruhi was in love with Tamaki. It was almost like we lost sight of what was important, because without her, none of us could see our futures anymore. She was a vision of sorts... but we moved on." Hikaru took a particularly long drink of sake. Aki found herself wanting to know how long he had been drinking this night. He breathed heavily after swallowing, his lips shiny and reddened as he spoke.

"I'm in clothing design... the company is my mother's. I managed to convince her to let me open a more stable branch out in this pit."

Aki flinched and raised an eyebrow. Hikaru met her eyes, unfazed.

"You looked like you wanted to know. Anyway—here I am." He raised his glass and smiled bitterly. "Congrats on the marriage." He drank.

Aki's now-dry hair veiled her face as she pondered the man's story. Her hands trembled as they held the bowl. Something... something didn't add up in his story. The end made it seem as though he had moved on, but his eyes said differently. The way he smiled with acceptance coating self-hatred like a sugared venom—the way she saw those tears come and go like a tide that burned to keep in check. He was hiding something. She took a piece of fish in her mouth to calm her nerves and when she finished chewing she set the bowl down and brushed her black hair over her shoulder. She twisted in her seat to face the man before her.

"If these people mean so much to you, why didn't you take the time to go to the wedding?"

"As I said," he almost scoffed, "emotional obligations."

"What could be keeping you from something important like that?" Aki gestured at his expensive clothes, "You _clearly_ have the money to afford a trip to Japan. So why are you here, drinking in a grubby bar when you could be having a beautiful reunion with your brother and your best friend?"

With a deafening crash, Hikaru slammed his cup on the bar. His eyes flashed and he gripped Aki's lapel fiercely. With a stifled sob he shouted.

"_Because I still love her!_"

The silence threatened to swallow them up. Aki stared at Hikaru with tears in her eyes, her lower lip pinned beneath white teeth. Hikaru panted softly, attempting to push back the tears he had swallowed for seven years. He would remain calm, he would remain in control, he would survive, he—

He broke. He didn't cry; he didn't expose some vulnerability to a girl he met in a bar, but he felt it. He felt everything within him collapse and all that was left was a memory. A small brunette girl with the largest, deepest eyes he could never see again as she smiled at him with more forgiveness than a saint.

_"Thanks, Hikaru. I forgive you."_

He bowed his head, "I still...love her." Aki gently brushed his pale hand off her lapel and took it into her own. She took a deep breath.

"I think... you should be there. Even if the outcome is the same, you can still remind her of the friendship you shared, and confess that nothing's changed on your behalf. She might even feel comforted by your loyalty if nothing else. Would you rather live knowing you never surrendered than to continue to force yourself to hide what you really feel?"

Hikaru shivered before brushing a hand over his face. An eternity seemed to pass in silence and the first breaths of dawn were breaking in the sky when Hikaru stood, fixed his shirt sleeves and pulled his jacket on. He flipped his hair out of his eyes and smiled softly at the young woman who sat at the bar.

"Perhaps." He stooped and hooked her person on a finger and held it out to her. "Young ladies should get home before the morning, right? Leave the dishes; Kawamura will be back soon. I'll hail you a cab." Aki, unable to speak, only nodded.

When sunlight began to creep into the sky above, Hikaru bundled Aki into a taxi and slid some bills onto the seat next to the driver. Aki rolled down her window and leaned out to offer some words of encouragement, yet found she could give nothing but a hopeful stare. Hikaru bent down and gave her a friendly kiss on the cheek.

"Take care of yourself, Aki Itou."

"You too, Hikaru Hitachiin."

And Aki Itou drove away, leaving the man with hidden red hair to fade into the shadows of a dying night.

* * *

_One week later._

"Aki, did you hear about that huge scandal in Japan?" Jennifer was bouncing around outside the young woman's cubicle. Aki resumed hammering away at her keyboard, not even looking towards her friend.

"No. What happened?"

"Apparently a _totally_ hot fashion designer guy interrupted one of their leading lawyer's weddings with a love confession! Get this—she stopped her wedding and ran away with him! It's a complete wreck in the upper class right now!"

Aki stopped typing and sat up straight. Her brows furrowed as a feeling that was both cold and warm bloomed in her chest. Then, she smiled.

Jennifer was impatient for a response, "_Well_? Isn't that like, totally crazy?"

Aki cleared her throat, "Oh—uh—yeah, Jen. Hey I really have to finish this report, so I'll talk to you after work. Sorry, girl, I _do _want to talk."

Jennifer rolled her eyes, "Whatever. Hey, let's go to dinner tonight. I heard about a delicious sushi bar on the other side of town!"

"Yeah, sure."

* * *

Upon arrival, Jennifer groaned with disappointment.

"Out of _business_? Of all the luck! Whatever, let's just go to Red Robin."

Aki stared at the ivory curtains, no longer lit with warm lantern light. She pressed against the glass door in the hopes of hearing zen music from inside. She breathed, attempting to smell rice that was no longer being served by a man in a suit worth more than her entire life.

Nor was there the sound of a sake glass hitting a wooden counter.

"Come _on_ Aki, it's closed. I'll find a new one in no time!"

Aki pulled away from the little restaurant and—with one final wash of nostalgia—resolved to forget the man on that rainy night, with his auburn lashes and diamond cufflinks.

* * *

_One year later._

"Hikaru, I still don't know what possessed you to come back...and I have no idea how you got Haruhi to go along with it."

Kaoru ran slender fingers through his flaming red hair, chuckling at his brother's ridiculous giddiness. Hikaru finished running kisses over his new wife's hand as she laughed lightheartedly, brushing off her pink tinged cheeks from her husband's unabashed behavior. He turned to his twin with a glowing look in his eyes.

"Well, truthfully... it was a girl."

Haruhi raised an expert eyebrow, already preparing her interrogation, "Oh? Sounds like a story." Hikaru grinned.

"That's exactly what I mean! She said that and somehow... I came back."

Kaoru listened with interest, crossing his arms. He listened as Hikaru told a story of a rainy night in a city across the world where he met a girl that listened to a stranger's story and changed his life. A girl that managed to convince his hard-headed twin brother to give it one last shot. Kaoru listened... and he decided he would like to meet that girl. So when he was alone he pulled out a cell phone and smiled softly to himself.

"Yes, I'd like a plane ticket to New York City."

"Yes, tomorrow."

* * *

**Hello, readers! This was an exercise in ambiance and roundabout story telling. Please read and review and tell me what you think! Have a lovely day.**


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